Work That Matters

I want my work to matter.

There, I've said it.

I want what I do to have an impact on others for good.  I want what I do to make a difference -  a real difference, not just a sense of doing what has to be done because it is required.

What I don't want - what it seems like I have too often lived - is essentially going through the motions of a career, doing what needs to be done, all without the sense of having an impact or reaching a point at which there is a sense of accomplishment:  a finish line, something that says "Yes, we did get here".

What I don't want - what I too often seem to end up with - is the sense that no matter what I do, there is no impact.  That no matter how hard I work, there is no finish line, no stepping up to the next height of the mountain; instead, there is only the endless track through the same wilderness through which we have just come.

I wonder, in all my looking, if I have subtly undone myself because I simply bear in the back of my mind that I do want to have an impact and I do want to do something that has measurable steps to it - that to this point over the last four years (if not longer), I am always looking at versions of what I am doing now.

If I want to be honest, why did I change course in 1996?  Surely it was not to do something different - I had like what I was doing in business college teaching much better.  It was the money and benefits.
And why did I suddenly change course again for The Firm?  At the heart, it was concern for money, of being left behind as success came and went for others but not for me.

And how did that all work out?  It has not been a total loss - the industry I am in pays well (better than most) and has allowed us to do some wonderful things and provide Na Clann with an education I might not have otherwise been able to. 

But looking at today, almost 15 years in, with the upcoming promise of another day of arriving with more than I can do and leaving with the same situation only to find the same thing tomorrow, I still wonder if it was maybe the right decision but not necessarily the best decision.

But if that is the case, what do I do about it?